Sources close to AMD have informed that Advanced Micro Devices has picked up Mike Houston. Houston is known for his work at Stanford University, most notably with the Folding@Home GPGPU client. At this time, it is unclear to us what Houston's title or specific role will be at AMD/ATI.

well paying a smart engineer is not braking bank, I believe its investment, and considering AMD could really use some smart people right now since they are blowing smoke on all fronts, performance wise.